Politics, popular culture and Reagan conservatism spewed maybe once a week...or less

Sunday, December 9, 2012

Obama is right on one thing: insurance companies are rotten

Insurance companies are rotten to the bone. Obama has based his entire health plan on this basic premise, and I wholeheartedly agree with him on this: insurance companies are not on your side or mine, they are out for themselves. It's not even arguable.

Now, Obama's remedy to temper abuses by insurance companies is not one I agree with, but that's an argument for another day.

The fact that we have over time allowed insurance companies to dictate how we manage our own health care is lamentable. These companies don't give a whit as to what is best for your health care or mine. Their primary and overriding concern is to their bottom line, and this concern is at odds with your health care interests.

Insurance companies got their foot in the health care door when during World War II, prices and wages were frozen to aid in the war effort at the time. In order to do an end around on these restrictions, companies rather than offer higher wages to attract workers, offered non-monetary benefits in the form of health care insurance. The Jeanie was let out of the bottle, and we have not been the same since, where prior to the insurance beast that was unleashed to ravage us, we simply paid for medical services as we received them.

Ah, the good ol' days.....

No use in pining away for them anymore, they are probably gone forever, payment for services rendered. But insurance company abuses may be the stuff of days gone by as well, now that a single payer system controlled by the government is on the rise.

Are we going to miss those rotten insurance companies when they are gone from our health care system? That depends, and we will see how things go.

Insurance companies are simply a mob of greedy lawyers, who write up an agreement with their prey, uh, er, I mean customers (called a policy). In this agreement, the customer agrees to give money in the form of premiums to the insurance company in exchange for coverage upon occurrence of an insured episode that might be covered within the policy.

Sounds good on the surface, right? No so fast, there, Kimosabe. Remember, these policies were written by lawyers employed by the insurance company, not by you. Who do you think these policies favor when a claim is filed?

Not you, buddy. Just a quick look at the process tells you that you are probably on the losing end in the event that you ever have to file a claim with these rotten sum bitches. If something happens to you, the first thing the policy holder does is file a 'claim.' This is not a withdrawal slip. Not even close. The claim is simply a request from you to the rotten insurance company that they owe you.

And who do you think verifies whether they owe you anything or not? THEY DO. Of course, their knee jerk reaction to any claim whatsoever is to deny it, without even looking into the claim. They let YOU do all of the work in verifying its validity. So off you go, writing letters, getting affidavits, gathering evidence and documents, and so it goes. You submit your findings to back up your 'claim.'

And who is the arbiter of determining whether your back up information has merit? THEY DO. Are we all starting to get the picture here?

The fact that Obama hates insurance companies because of this has been the underlying motivation for him to change all of that. I agree that insurance companies are not the solution to our health care system. Both Barack Obama and I are in complete and joyous agreement on that.

But Obama's solution to put government in charge of our health care in place of insurance companies is akin to putting sumo wrestlers in charge of Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig: we will go from an unpalatable system to one that is absolutely and totally miserable.

I am now on Medicare, and pay for an outrageously expensive supplement plan. But I have not had to pay a penny to a doctor or hospital (although I still have to pay for my medicines).

The problem that developed with insurance companies is that they were prevented from being in competition with one another in terms of costs and provisions. They were also prevented from doing business across state lines. All of this was the result of federal regulations.

What is needed to bring them back in line with reality is to remove those above mentioned restrictions and allow the market to determine costs.

As usual, the government is at the root of the major problems with business.

I will say that they are certainly out to make money (but that's the only reason to be in business in the first place, I guess). They do that well.

Their charges are outrageous and their profits are probably higher than can be justified.

I tried selling insurance once, but could not bring myself to lie to the potential customer like they wanted me to.

I would not buy dog food from "flo," or Progressive. There are some companies with more integrity than others, but it is hard to tell which is which.

On the whole, the contract (policy) is the guiding force, and the customer has the burden of seeing that it is what he/she needs. The company is only out for itself.

When a company refuses to cover something, it is theoretically in line with what the policy states, sometimes in fine print or legaleeze. But they look for every opportunity not to pay...that's for sure.

Coverage item for coverage item, all companies charge about the same, because competition is almost non-existant for anything other than their brand name.

Proper competition would solve a lot of issues, but it is a long way off, if it ever gets here.

If you have ever read through an insurance policy, which almost nobody has, you would notice the disclaimers, exceptions and so forth take up about 90% of the document: you know, the stuff that benefits THEM and not you. The paragraph that describes YOUR benefits is maybe a paragraph or two, at best.

Also, go ahead and try to cross out any verbiage in the policy, then submit it for signature, see what happens.

Its all on THEIR turf, and they have the upper hand in any claim, as well as all of your premiums in the bank.

It's a racket, and I too had an insurance license for awhile and they do indeed want the agent to bend facts and fudge terms.